


You look in the mirror and the mirror looks away

by thought



Category: Wolf 359 (Radio)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Star Trek, Discovery fusion, Gen, POV Second Person, blink and you miss it Kepler/Cutter and Pryce/Cutter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-03
Updated: 2018-03-03
Packaged: 2019-03-26 15:49:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,607
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13860984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thought/pseuds/thought
Summary: It isn't that you set out to create a team as much as it is one just sort of falls into your lap.





	You look in the mirror and the mirror looks away

**Author's Note:**

> Ok listen, Star Trek Discovery is a hot fucking dumpster fire but I couldn't stop comparing Lorca and Kepler, just let me live.  
> Also note: even though this contains no Trek characters, it follows the plot of the first season pretty closely until around episode 12-ish, so please be aware of spoilers.

You find Alana first.

(No. Maxwell. Do not forget.)

Can't abide anyone less intelligent than she is no matter what reality she hails from. Second verse, same as the first, too smart to stay quiet and too angry to know what to do with that power once she's got it.

(The news cycles say Maxwell started a war. Alana would be proud. Or jealous. Hard to know.)

This version of her is soft, like this entire fucking universe.

(False; 0;)

She stands in front of you in prison orange and meets your gaze head-on and the only word you can think to describe her is resigned. You hate it, and, consequently, you hate her, at first.

You keep her on board anyway. You know the weapon that Alana Maxwell's mind is and you think maybe this time you'll be able to control it. No surprises. No knives in your back, not again.

She doesn't like to be touched. Doesn't like the way you've already got most of the crew following you unquestioningly. So you fold your hands behind your back. You offer explanations for your choices when she asks. You stand just a bit too close behind her when she's hunched over her consul in Engineering and you watch the way she starts working faster, better, so goddamn eager to show off.

(Adapt. Do not fuck this up. again.)

You dig a little deeper into her history, find a backwater colony, a father too fond of an unforgiving higher power and a mother too fond of the way a fist feels on a cheekbone or a jaw. In this universe her anger wasn't born of frustration and arrogance as much as it was born of necessity.

Ok. You can work with this. You give her a second chance and she doesn't even try all that hard to pretend she's not grateful. You do some reading on her former captain. The one she got killed. Once you've finished making the background image on your PADD the line from the official report that says "Young, Rachel: KIA" , you do some thinking.

The misstep is immediately obvious. Maxwell had liked her, been loyal to her, respected her. She hadn't trusted her. captain Young had shown herself in full to Maxwell, all cards on the table, and Maxwell had decided she held a better hand.

10\. Jack. Queen. King. War.

Oops.

You've always had an excellent poker face. You make sure Maxwell knows you're hiding things, makes sure she knows there's a larger plan she isn't yet aware of. That, and a firm hand, and an honest acknowledgement and respect of her competence, and she's yours.

"The only reason I joined Starfleet was for the research opportunities," she tells you. "I don't really think we should be out here trying to drag other races into a political structure based in human ideals. We aren't exactly impressive as a species. Not yet, at least."

you don't laugh at her, but it's a close thing. "I know," you say instead. That pisses her off, but you're not going to pretend she's a better liar than she is.

*

You don't expect Daniel Jacobi.

(Recalculate. Choose your pain. Choose your weapon. Choose another one, just to be safe.)

If there is a Daniel Jacobi in your universe you've never heard of him. But when you see the desperate eyes peering up at you from behind a curtain of dirty hair and blood, you can't resist the possibilities. Jacobi is a mess of malleable iron, practically begging to be reformed into something indestructible.

He's soft, but not weak. Couldn't be, to survive this long in Klingon captivity.

You rescue him. Or, you help him to rescue himself. The details aren't as important as the fact that he understands that it is you who got him out, not the Federation. Not Starfleet.

He's unfamiliar, but not that hard to figure out. You push him. You give him responsibility before he thinks he's ready and he rises to the occasion. His hands don't even shake while he defuses the bomb.

Jacobi and Maxwell fall together like they've been waiting poised on an edge their entire lives up to this point. They orbit you, wary but already caught, twin stars. You aren’t subtle about your preference for the two of them, and consequently the rest of the crew keeps their distance.

(Isolate. Everyone becomes harder when they’re alone. Look in the mirror.)

You give them both second chances at life and they understand without having to be told that this means those lives belong to you now. You do the whiskey speech anyway. Take the small pleasures where you can.

*

You don't expect the visit from the admiralty. One Admiral, maybe, and even then you are meant to have an unprecedented degree of autonomy. That's the whole point of The Discovery. The whole reason it was given to you. To him. Accurate either way.

But Admiral Cutter and Admiral Pryce seem determined to poke into every aspect of your command, each decision you've made dragged out and examined like corpses.

Cutter touches the soft place on the inside of your elbow with a gentle hand and you think you know how to distract him, but he leaves before you can even pretend to fall asleep.

"Don't forget our agreement, warren," he says, running fingers through your hair and then yanking hard enough to bring tears to your eyes. Pryce is watching from the other side of the room, and Cutter makes a show of letting her kiss him, reclaim him, before they both leave.

You want to kill them both. You want to snarl that you have never seen either of them before in your life, that you don't give a damn about whatever little games they think they're playing with this version of you. But instead you pour yourself a glass of whiskey and set a plan into motion that should get them both out of the way for the foreseeable future.

It doesn't work.

(don't think about it. Stay focused.)

*

You've got bigger things to worry about than a couple nosey admirals, because Doug Eiffel has gone and made friends with aliens who only communicate through music (of course it's Eiffel, of course it is, you're not even surprised) and then the Klingons are converging on the planet and you order Lovelace into the drive chamber with the full knowledge that what you are asking of her will likely kill her.

good. You don't like the way she's watched you ever since she injected herself with the Tardigrade DNA. There's something alien in her eyes now, something far too aware.

The battle is fast, efficient, and brutal, and you feel more like yourself than you have in the last year. Afterward, everyone is shaky with adrenaline and relief, joy at the cloaking pattern you've managed to discover, eager to start moving towards home. You count yourself among their number, though for different reasons.

Maxwell and Jacobi are not looking forward to returning to their homes. For Maxwell, it means prison. For Jacobi, it likely means an honourable discharge and years of therapy. They stick close together, both of them always watching you from the corner of their eyes. It feels almost like they're waiting for something.

(You've never been one to disappoint.)

Lovelace makes the final jump and you welcome the momentary twist of reality, the way your whole body seems to separate into particles and drop away from your mind, then rush back too fast and too hard. The stars on the viewscreen are suddenly familiar, and even as everyone around you struggles to figure out what is happening, you take a moment to bask in the simple knowledge that you've done it. You've made it home.

Jacobi and Maxwell follow you into your ready room after the initial confrontation, and you pour them each a glass of whiskey before you pour your own. Jacobi looks confused, but Maxwell is watching you intently, calculations almost visible behind her eyes.

"What are we toasting, Sir?" she asks.

You smile.

[a calculated risk.]

"A homecoming," you say. "Welcome home."

"Oh," says Maxwell, and drinks all of her whiskey very fast.

"Wait," Jacobi says, "You--"

"Yes, Mr. Jacobi."

"Huh," Jacobi says, after a minute. "Ok."

*

You thought the Federation version of yourself would be soft, like that entire fucking universe.

(False; 0;)

"It seemed only fair," he says. You say. "I assumed you had taken my place, so naturally I saw fit to take yours."

You fold your hands behind your back in what you only now realize has become a habitual motion. "And yet you don't appear to be Emperor yet."

"No. My vision is a little ...broader than a simple power grab, and Emperor Young agreed with my plan once it was... fully explained to her. Unfortunately, there's no room for two of us. But don't worry. I' know all about your pets, and I don't think it will be difficult to convince them I'm the Warren Kepler they've known all along. After all, they're used to trusting you without question, aren’t they?"

You don't even have time to lift your gun. Emperor Rachel Young stabs you through the back with a sigh of enjoyment like she's just stepped into a long-awaited hot bath.  
The last thing you hear, Warren Kepler, is the satisfied sing-song of Admiral Marcus Cutter.

"Warren. I'm so glad you've kept to our agreement. Things are going just as planned."

Anyway, long story short, this is how you die.

(No. Go back. Try again.)

Anyway, long story short, this is how _he_ dies.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm [thought_42](http://thought_42.tumblr.com) on tumblr


End file.
